UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. -- All three men have the right to be pissed off about last year. To have a chip on their shoulder. Ready to silence critics and make doubters eat their words.
The big key for Penn State will be how all three of them find a way to work together and co-exist in working toward their own goals while also putting their desire for personal success on the backburner in order to best serve the team.
It's ego check time.
For all three of them.
And given some recent comments, you'd have to think they all understand it, too.
You have the head coach, James Franklin, who has done some wonderful things for Penn State but has been ridiculed by nearly everyone after going 11-11 over the past two seasons. But Franklin does have a whopper of a new contract -- 10 years and $85 million -- so he has the comfort of knowing that he won't be going anywhere for a long time.
Then you have the offensive coordinator, Mike Yurcich, whose first year with the Nittany Lions was an unmitigated disaster. He came to Penn State with a great reputation as an offensive mind -- a reputation that was tarnished quite a bit last year -- and probably feeling like a couple of great seasons with the Lions could land him his own head coaching job.
Then you have the new defensive coordinator, Manny Diaz, who was head coach at one of the nation's most storied programs, Miami, the past three years. He probably feels like he got a raw deal there, getting fired after going 15-8 the past two seasons. Almost everyone believes Diaz will be a head coach again very soon, perhaps after only one season at Penn State.
Franklin is a really good college CEO, a guy who is adept at overseeing all aspects of the massive operation.
But the main question with Franklin, when it comes to coordinators, is: Will he let them do their jobs the way they see fit, to be the head coach of their units?
Franklin did that with former defensive coordinator Brent Pry, someone he has known forever and had built-in trust. And Franklin did that with former offensive coordinator Joe Moorhead, who quickly earned respect and showed his system could work in 2016.
But Franklin didn't seem to fully let go with Ricky Rahne or Kirk Ciarrocca when they were offensive coordinators. Those guys were still sort of running remnants of the Moorhead offense, whether they truly wanted to or not, especially Ciarrocca.
Will Franklin let Diaz come in and fully run his own defense? The whole ultra-aggressive, turnover chain style that can produce big rewards but also brings more risk into the equation.
Could there be any sort of ego clashing there, if Franklin wants to resort back to some level of the bend-but-don't-break style that he has preferred at Penn State?
Will Franklin let Yurcich fully run his system, after the OC failed last year, by and large because the offensive line was terrible and the team couldn't run the ball? Has Yurcich fully earned Franklin's trust as a playcaller, after inexcusably failing to take advantage of Michigan State's poor pass defense and then abandoning the run the one time it seemed to be working against Arkansas.
In Franklin's eight years as head coach, I don't recall him bringing up the word "ego" very often. He's a very smart guy and usually chooses his words carefully, but from my memory at least, he hasn't harped on the ego element very much at all.
But twice in the past month, Franklin has mentioned the word ego.
The Penn State coaches went on a retreat before training camp to hash out things and prepare for the season. Franklin said this on media day Aug. 6:
"One of the things we talked about on the retreat is not being led by ego. You're up 35-0 in the game, and I'm on the headset saying, 'Hey, we need to sub out, get our backups in.' Whether it's the defensive coordinator or offensive coordinator saying, 'I just want to get one more drive, there's still plenty of time in the fourth quarter,' but a lot of times you're doing that because you want to preserve the shutout.
"I want the shutout as much as anybody. But what's more valuable? The shutout or getting those guys in there and letting them play valuable minutes and gaining experience?"
That seemed like a relatively benign reference to the ego concept, and Franklin is right when it comes to getting younger players into games being more important than finishing off a shutout.
But, a few days later, Franklin mentioned the ego stuff again.
"You have a system, and your system needs to have enough flexibility in it to take advantage of your personnel," Franklin said Aug. 10. "Now, everybody says that. And what happens, a lot of times is people want to call what their identity is and what they've done in the past. That's on offense and defense.
"But the reality is, you have to be flexible enough and put your ego to the side to do what's best for your team. And that's easier said than done. Because you may want to be a 10 personnel team with four wides on the field all the time. But if you got a bunch of really good tight ends, you better have the flexibility to use them. I think you see some of the stuff that we're doing with the tight ends. That's kind of what I'm talking about. You got to be willing to play to your strengths, no matter what."
Maybe I'm wrong, but a lot of that seems to be a not-so-thinly veiled critique of Yurcich. The OC may want to do all sorts of air-raid kind of stuff, but this is Penn State, this is the Big Ten, and any OC has got to learn to adapt to, you know, what actually works here.
So, after mentioning the ego stuff twice in five days, one would have to believe that is a big point of emphasis for Franklin this year.
The issue, though, is whose ego?
Because, again, we're talking about three men who have had success in their careers, and they all probably feel to some degree that they know the best way to do things.
We're also talking about a head coach whose biggest weakness has clearly been his game day coaching, and how he corrects that ultimately could determine the success level of his career.
Can Yurcich put his ego aside and do what's best with the Penn State personnel?
Can Franklin, a former offensive coordinator himself, put his ego aside and let Yurcich fully run the offense?
Can Diaz put his ego aside and play to the strengths of his personnel, if perhaps all the pieces aren't there to play the ultra-aggressive style? Because a lot of times, in order to play very aggressively, you have to have really good linebackers who can do a host of things well (rush, tackle in space, cover, etc.). It's a big question whether the Lions have those kinds of linebackers this year.
Can Franklin put his ego aside and allow Diaz to keep playing aggressively even if the defense gives up some big plays early in the season? Or will the coach insist on getting back to the bend-but-don't-break style?
The bottom line is, can all three of these guys be on the same page, even though some of what they like to do may be in contrast with what Franklin prefers?
That's going to be very interesting to watch as the season plays out.